• Find a children and families services inspection report
• Understanding a children and families services inspection report
• Types of children and families services Ofsted inspects
• Inspecting children and families services
  • Inspecting children's social care
  • Inspecting Cafcass
  • Inspecting children's centres
  • Inspecting and assessing local authority children's services
• Types of children and families services Ofsted regulates
• Regulating children and families services
• Rights for me
• About our survey reports
• How to complain

Inspecting and assessing local authority children's services

A local authority is another name for your local council.

Your local authority provides lots of services to your community and one of them is to look after vulnerable children and young people that live in the local area.

At Ofsted we carry out inspections on the part of the council that is responsible for looking after those children to see how it is doing.

We have two types of inspection for a local authority.

• Inspections of safeguarding and looked after children services: These inspections look at how well the local authority keeps children safe and cares for the children that it looks after, such as those that live with foster parents. These inspections will end in July 2012.
• Inspections of local authority arrangements for the protection of children: These unannounced inspections look at how well the local authority and its partners identifies, helps and protects children in the local authority area. These inspections began in May 2012.

Our previous unannounced inspections of child protection were shorter inspections that looked at how well a local authority helped children that need or may need protection from adults in their life. These inspections ended in January 2012.

Inspections of safeguarding and looked after children services

Before an inspection

We usually tell the local authority it will have an inspection about 10 days before we arrive. We have surveys that ask children and young people that are being looked after or who have recently left care what they think of the care they’ve received. We also use surveys for social workers and other people who might be involved in the care.

During an inspection

The inspection lasts up to 10 days. The inspectors look at documents and speak to users, including children and young people, parents and carers; local authority staff; health agencies; and other interested parties. The inspectors tell the local authority what they have found out and what the children’s surveys said.

After an inspection

The lead inspector writes the report.

We publish the report on this website within 25 days of the end of the inspection.

Inspections of local authority arrangements for the protection of children

Before an inspection

We do not tell the local authority that there will be an inspection.

During an inspection

The inspection takes eight days. It covers things like: talking to children, young people, parents and carers; seeing social workers at work; and looking at case files. The inspectors will tell the local authority if they find a serious situation where there are still things that the local authority needs to do to protect a child or young person.

After an inspection

The lead inspector writes the report, which includes grades. We publish the report on this website within 22 days of the end of the inspection; there is also a version for children and young people.

Annual children’s services assessment

We also carry out annual assessments.

Before the assessment

Our annual assessment recognises the important role that a local authority has in ensuring that good or better quality services and settings improve outcomes for children and young people.

So we check how good the local authority is by looking at the information that we have gathered about it in our previous inspections, other survey work and sometimes from government information.

During the assessment

Our inspectors use this information to write the annual children’s services assessment letter and make judgements about how good the local authority’s services for children are.

After the assessment

Her Majesty’s Chief Inspector of Education, Children’s Services and Skills will approve the final children’s services assessment for all local authorities. We will then publish the annual assessment letter and a summary of the latest performance profile in November on our website.